Mr. Speaker, the member is absolutely right. First, there are some serious concerns about whether provincial court judges currently have the background to deal with some of the issues related to the complex property codes. Also, the member rightly pointed out the issues related to common law status in provinces such as Quebec and its recognition by provincial governments.
What we would actually be doing is setting up a regime that would have different rules applying to different first nations across the country. There would not be any confidence that if one lived in one province, one would have access to the same property rights one would have in another province. That is certainly one problem, and it is a problem a number of witnesses identified in terms of both the current provincial court rules on matrimonial real property division and a judge's ability, currently, to interpret those complex land codes.
The second matter the member raised in her question was, of course, the whole process of how the bill came forward and how we were able to hear from witnesses. Witnesses were limited in their ability to testify. Certainly we were limited in our ability to pose questions. It is our responsibility as parliamentarians to do that due diligence when we have legislation before us to make sure that we understand the legislation and its implications.